A Travelling Director - Helen Waldmann

Return to Sender is an attempt by Helen to focus on
the lives of migrants whose stories are often neglected.

(c) Puja Goyal

A traveling director would be an apt introduction to Helen Waldmann who travels the world to create a platform where actors can speak their voice, "I want actors to talk about what is bothering them, their country, their life and most importantly what they want people to know. The media is always telling what they want people to know… but the real issues of the people are more important."

Six Iranian performers come together in Return to Sender to put in front of the audiences, the responses of Iranian women, who are forced into exile due to political unrest. It speaks of the anguishes which haunt them and the freedom they have to fight for in order to survive. "In most of my shows, I want the actor to be the author of the play. We start with a clean platform and build a play from that. We allow a lot of room for improvisation, but stop when the play is ready. For example: here we have a tent; we think what can we do with a tent?" continues Helen. The main theme of the play is the tent into which the bodies of the actors disappear as the play proceeds.

Return to Sender is an attempt by Helen to bring focus to the live of migrants whose stories are often neglected. The play has received different responses based on where it is performed, Helen explains, "Audiences from different countries have varied reactions; it depends on if the audience gets involved or not; otherwise it becomes dry. The response in Kabul was tremendous as they could relate to the life of a migrant. We have issues in Berlin too but no one notices until they see such a play. The problem is that people forget."

Letters from Tentland, a play censored by the Iranian government was written by non-migrant Iranians and Helen is not quite happy about their performance, "Return to Sender can be called a sequel to Letters from Tentland where the letters are projected on the screen by me for the actors to enact. The play is my take on what I see, observe and what I understand of the state of the migrants. When I saw Letters from Tentland, I thought something was wrong; the actors did not look genuine because they were ignorant of what it was to live like a migrant. "Return to Sender" is different in that perspective. They are compiled with the viewpoint of a migrant."

Many directors and writers choose women as the cliché medium to tell a story but Helen had other reasons to choose women, as she cites, "I was invited to Tehran to give a workshop in 2004. It was an all women group, and I am a woman so the atmosphere was much more open. They were my only access to actors, so I have given the play a women's perspective."

Return to Sender, elaborates the apathetic conditions in which migrants live; it also puts to rest fallacies that migrants have more freedom and opportunities outside their country says Helen, "In Iran, there is a misconception that a migrant is better off and more independent. They don’t realize that the migrant goes through much pressure and has absolutely no freedom. The migrants live in constant fear that their family and relations back home will be targeted if they do something offensive, that their people will not approve off."

Return to Sender - Letters from Tentland a play created by Helen premiered on the 7th of September at RangaShankara.